Understanding Childhood: Themes and approaches

Kimberly Boekhoudt Children and International Development University of Amsterdam March 1, 2011

Throughout the years, there has been an increasing interest in research on children across the world. When researching children, we come across important concepts like child and childhood and the different meanings or perspectives of these concepts, depending on your point of view. In this essay I will discuss the idea of childhood as a social construct. This idea has become more and more important when researching children in the recent decades. According to the article At Home in the Street: Street Children of Northeast Brazil by Hecht (1998: 70), there are two competing ways of viewing childhood. He distinguishes nurtured childhood, in which theres a more universal social experience of childhood by children around the world, and nurturing childhood, in which childhood is socially constructed and variable according to the context in which its experienced. The idea of childhood being socially constructed means that theres not one universal way that children experience childhood, but that there are different variables that play a role in their childhood experience. Variables such as culture, gender, social class and ethnicity can have a direct or indirect effect on the childhood of a child. Thus not every child experiences the same kind of childhood. For example, a child that grows up in a rich environment has a different childhood than a child who grows up in a poor environment. In a rich environment children are often seen as an endless expense. Many rich families are not big; they only have one or two children. These children are provided with the best education and the best possible way of living to prepare them for their future. In contrast, children living in a poor environment are seen as way of getting an extra income for the family. Many poor families are big and the survival of that family depends on everyone in it. Thus children have to take on responsibilities at a young age and go out and work to bring money to the household instead of going to school to get an education. These children dont enjoy or dont even have a childhood like children who grow up in a richer environment. Historical changes have also had an effect on the location and value of children in different socio-cultural contexts. Like, for example, the way children are viewed during the colonial and postcolonial time and wars. All these historical events have changed a country and its people. Children were seen before as mature individuals that can work, later this notion slightly began to change. In the Western World, the construction of the global child is often used. By the global child we understand that all the worlds children are the same. And therefore that all the worlds children have or should have the same childhood experience. This Western view on childhood is universalized and often set as a standard when researching childhood of children. This construction of the global child has had some consequences for children in the Global South. Some of the consequences are that this Western view doesnt take into account other realities that are taking place in the Global South nor the context in which this childhood is experienced. For example, the Indian childhood that is discussed in the article Editorial: Is there an Indian Childhood by Olga Nieuwenhuys (2009). The Indian childhood is seen as being behind and therefore it must catch up with the West (Nieuwenhuys (2009): 150). By setting a standard these children, who experience different childhoods, are seen as outsiders and as a consequence theyre even more excluded. Different social-cultural contexts in which children grow up may affect their aspirations, goals, expectations and opportunities, but also the construction of their identity. For example, children who are raised in a rich environment have different aspirations, goals, expectations and opportunities compared to children who are raised in a poor environment. These children have access to an (better) education, a more suiting way of life and have greater chance at having a career and keeping the lifestyle they already have. Whilst children, who are raised in a poor environment, often dont go to school, prefer to work and dont get the same opportunities. These children often grow up content with their way of life, because theres no other way. Or even if theres another, its a long way ahead that not everyone will achieve. Another issue that can affect the aspirations, goals, expectations and opportunities of children is the issue of gender. In some cultures boys are preferred rather than girls. They are seen as the future provider for the family. These boys attend school and have a much bigger chance in

achieving something in their lives, compared to girls who rarely go to school and therefore are limited to any future opportunities. These girls grow up to become women with no education, poor health, and high unemployment rates, because they are seen as a minority. These women dont really have the chance to create an identity for themselves and they live most of their lives in the shadows of their husbands. They are mainly expected to take care of the household and the children. In some cultures, for example in Nigeria, child marriage is very common and a tradition. Child marriage is mostly due to the existence of gender inequality in a country or the socio-economic development of the country (Bunting, 2005: 24). Child marriage is seen by the Western World as something that is not right or not excepted, but in other cultures early marriage is seen as a benefit or the solution to their problems. By marrying a girl in the family, the family acquires the security of someone else, in this case the boy/man, taking care of the family financially wise in the future. The lack of education and the lack of employment opportunities for women also contribute to early marriages. Women rather marry young and have a provider than not having one at all. This brings me to the last point in which I will discuss the concepts cultural relativists and universalists. By cultural relativists we understand that practices can only be understood and valued within the culture in which they take place. And by universalists we understand that there are universal values that apply to all, at all times and even everywhere concerning the validity and the application of the United Nations Convention on the Rights of a Child (1989). The CRC is based on the protection of children and their rights and also on the representation of children as subjects of right, not as objects. The CRC is mainly based on the Western view of what children rights should be and how they should be protected. Though, many of these rights are challenging for some countries of the world. Although the CRC has its positive input on promoting the rights of children, the idea that moral judgments on childrens rights should be universal is not an accurate way of enforcing the CRC. By setting moral judgments universally, you dont take into account the different cultures around the world, non-Western, and their moral values and judgments. Cultural relativists on the other hand take into consideration the different values and norms that other non-Western countries have. This view of moral judgments also has its complications. Its quite difficult to pick sides between these two concepts. I think that there are some articles in the CRC that you must consider universally, but there are also others that you must consider within the cultural relativism. Thus we must understand why something is done in a culture, what is its value, in order to point if its right or wrong. Yet it remains difficult to say what is wrong or right. A value or norm that we, the Western world, consider wrong isnt necessarily seen as wrong in a non-western country. Such as the case we saw in the article Masculinity and punishment: mens upbringing of boys in rural Vietnam by Helle Rydstrom (2006) in which the corporal punishment of boys is seen as a way of claiming or asserting masculinity. Concluding we can say that there are various elements that have to be taken into account when researching children, their childhood and their rights. We cannot only view these concepts from a Western point of view, but we have to take into consideration the cultures in which they grew up and the different values and norms that these cultures have before we put a stamp on what is right or wrong. Setting standards of what is considered the right way of doing things can be very problematic, because we end up excluding the children who fall off of these standards even more than they already are.

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